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Feature Request FR-5031
Product Area AI Features
Status ROADMAP

1 Voters

Add Computed Columns to AI Interactive Reports

jon dixon Public · Sep 22 2026

Idea Summary
Enable the AI Assistant in Interactive Reports to create, modify, and remove computed columns using natural language.

APEX 26.1 allows users to configure Interactive Reports through natural-language requests, but currently does not allow the assistant to create report computations. Users must create these manually or ask a developer to add the calculation to the report’s SQL source.

Supporting the existing Interactive Report Compute capability would let users derive additional values from available report columns without needing to understand expression syntax. Those values could then support further filtering, sorting, highlighting, and analysis wherever native report computations support those operations.

Use Case
Examples include:

  • Project budgets: “Add a Remaining Budget column calculated as Budget minus Actual Cost, and highlight negative values.”
  • Sales: “Add a Gross Margin Percentage column calculated as Revenue minus Cost, divided by Revenue, multiplied by 100. Leave it blank when Revenue is zero.”
  • Order management: “Add an Outstanding Quantity column calculated as Ordered Quantity minus Shipped Quantity, and show rows where it is greater than zero.”

This would also allow AI to get more creative when creating summaries etc. because it could create a computed column then summarize on that.

Preferred Solution (Optional)
Extend the built-in AI Interactive Report functionality to manage computations through the existing native Compute capability.

The assistant should:

  • Use only permitted report columns and supported computation expressions, respecting developer settings and existing access controls.

  • Create an appropriate column label and format mask.

  • Show the generated expression and a plain-language explanation so users can inspect and edit the calculation.

  • Ask for clarification when business meaning is ambiguous, such as whether “margin” means an amount or a percentage.

  • Validate expressions before applying them, including data types and handling of nulls and division by zero.

  • Support subsequent requests to modify or remove the computation, and preserve it through the existing saved-report functionality.

    Calculations should execute through the normal report engine. The AI’s role would be to translate the request into a validated report computation. You should be able to disable this feature.

This is planned for a future APEX release.